When A Strong Person Breaks Down Quotes

Do you ever get the feeling that when you show someone your affection for them, you are assaulting them? Like you should probably leave them alone? Your affection, no matter how sincere, does not necessarily mean a damn thing to the person you are giving it to. Love can corner you. When you intrude on someone with your affection, you might find yourself trying to knock a strong door down with your shoulder. Either you break the door or you break yourself. Something almost always gets broken. In my mind it runs like this: I’m going to like you, whether you like it or not. I’ll wear you down until you relent and swallow this big lie I have for you. Don’t move. Don’t live. I love you.

All the towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests ultimately upon one assumption; a false assumption. It is supposed that if a thing goes on repeating itself it is probably dead; a piece of clockwork. People feel that if the universe was personal it would vary; if the sun were alive it would dance. This is a fallacy even in relation to known fact. For the variation in human affairs is generally brought into them, not by life, but by death; by the dying down or breaking off of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some slight element of failure or fatigue. He gets into an omnibus because he is tired of walking; or he walks because he is tired of sitting still. But if his life and joy were so gigantic that he never tired of going to Islington, he might go to Islington as regularly as the Thames goes to Sheerness. The very speed and ecstacy of his life would have the stillness of death. The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every morning; but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical ENCORE. Heaven may ENCORE the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every human drama man is called again and again before the curtain. Repetition may go on for millions of years, by mere choice, and at any instant it may stop. Man may stand on the earth generation after generation, and yet each birth be his positively last appearance.

Love is powerful; it can be for good and bad. Love can make you, and it can break you. Love teaches you who you are as a person. Love shows you who you can live with or without. Love can take you to the next level, or it can bring you down quicker than the blink of an eye. Love is a strong foundation, overall, when all is said and done—love is still there.

Raw emotions and the need to hold him close overwhelmed me. Every part of ached for him-my mind, my soul and my body. Without hesitation, i closed the gap between us and pressed my lips eagerly to his. Noah's hands were everywhere, my hair, my face, my back, and for the love of all things holy, my breasts. My hands roamed his glorious body just as greedily. After drugging me with delicious kisses for not nearly long enough, his warm lips skimmed my throat and kissed down the center of my breasts, causing me to arch my back and lose my ever loving mind. Without meaning to, i moaned and whispered his name when his hands wandered to my thighs and set my world and blood on fire. Noah eased me back into the bed and my hair sprawled all around me. "I love how you smell," he whispered as he suckled my earlobe. "I love how beautiful you are." I reclaimed his lips and hooked a leg around his as we moved in rhythm with each other. In between frantic kisses, i whispered the words, "I love you". Because i did. Noah listened to me. He made me laugh and he made me feel special. He was strong and warm and caring and...everything. I loved him. I loved him more than i'd ever loved another person in my life. Every muscle in my body froze when Noah stopped kissing and stare down at me with wide eyes. He caressed my cheek twice over and tilted his head. "Make love to me, Echo. I've never made love." No way. Noah's experienced reputation walked down the hallway before he did. "But..." Noah cut me off with a kiss. "Yes, but never love. Just girls who didn't mean anything" You..." His tongue teased my bottom lip, thawing my body. "Are everything. I got tested over winter break and i'm clean and i've got protection." He reached to the side of the bed and magically produced a small orange square. I froze again. Sensing my hesitation, Noah kissed my lips slowly while stroking my cheek. "And since break?" I asked. "There's been no one," he whispered against my lips. "I met you soon after and i could never think of touching anyone else." I loved him and we were together. I entwined my fingers in his hair and pulled his head back to mine, but the second his hand touched the waist of my jeans, my heart shook and my hands snapped out to stop him. "Please. Wait. Noah..." Oh, God, i was actually going to say it. "I'm a virgin." Now Noah froze. "But you were with Luke." A faint smile grew on my lips. I was typically the tongue-tied one and found it amusing to see him confused for once. "That's why we broke up. I wasn't ready." He shifted his body off of mine and tuckled me close against his warmth. I laid my head on his chest and listened to the comforting sound of his beating heart. Noah ran his hand through my hair. "I'm glad you told me. This needs to be right for you and i'll wait, for as long as you need.

How do people get to this clandestine Archipelago? Hour by hour planes fly there, ships steer their course there, and trains thunder off to it--but all with nary a mark on them to tell of their destination. And at ticket windows or at travel bureaus for Soviet or foreign tourists the employees would be astounded if you were to ask for a ticket to go there. They know nothing and they've never heard of the Archipelago as a whole or any one of its innumerable islands. Those who go to the Archipelago to administer it get there via the training schools of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Those who go there to be guards are conscripted via the military conscription centers. And those who, like you and me, dear reader, go there to die, must get there solely and compulsorily via arrest. Arrest! Need it be said that it is a breaking point in your life, a bolt of lightning which has scored a direct hit on you? That it is an unassimilable spiritual earthquake not every person can cope with, as a result of which people often slip into insanity? The Universe has as many different centers as there are living beings in it. Each of us is a center of the Universe, and that Universe is shattered when they hiss at you: "You are under arrest." If you are arrested, can anything else remain unshattered by this cataclysm? But the darkened mind is incapable of embracing these dis­placements in our universe, and both the most sophisticated and the veriest simpleton among us, drawing on all life's experience, can gasp out only: "Me? What for?" And this is a question which, though repeated millions and millions of times before, has yet to receive an answer. Arrest is an instantaneous, shattering thrust, expulsion, somer­sault from one state into another. We have been happily borne—or perhaps have unhappily dragged our weary way—down the long and crooked streets of our lives, past all kinds of walls and fences made of rotting wood, rammed earth, brick, concrete, iron railings. We have never given a thought to what lies behind them. We have never tried to pene­trate them with our vision or our understanding. But there is where the Gulag country begins, right next to us, two yards away from us. In addition, we have failed to notice an enormous num­ber of closely fitted, well-disguised doors and gates in these fences. All those gates were prepared for us, every last one! And all of a sudden the fateful gate swings quickly open, and four white male hands, unaccustomed to physical labor but none­theless strong and tenacious, grab us by the leg, arm, collar, cap, ear, and drag us in like a sack, and the gate behind us, the gate to our past life, is slammed shut once and for all. That's all there is to it! You are arrested! And you'll find nothing better to respond with than a lamblike bleat: "Me? What for?" That's what arrest is: it's a blinding flash and a blow which shifts the present instantly into the past and the impossible into omnipotent actuality. That's all. And neither for the first hour nor for the first day will you be able to grasp anything else.

Well, let's consider the value of the dollar. Ultimately, logically, the dollar has no value at all. It's a piece of paper. It only has value because we say it has value, and because we agree on a system of bartering that maintains that value. Great care is taken to keep the value of the dollar strong. Smart guys in Washington and New York lose sleep over this. And we all watched what happend in Argentina a few years ago. We watched what happened when the value of currency declined rapidly. It's not a good thing. Sex is like that. God is concerned with the value of sex staying high. It's important to a person's health, a family's health, and a society's health. But like anything, sex can be cheapened in our minds, so we don't hold it in high esteem. God doesn't think this is a good thing. Stuff God doesn't think is good is called sin. "What happens when sex is cheaped?" somebody asked. A lot happens. The main thing is there is no sacred physical territory associated with commitment. There can still be emotional territory, but there isn't anything physical, experiential, that a man and a woman have only with each other. Sleeping around does something to the heart, to the mind. It leaves less commodity to spend on a sacred mate. But all of that sounds pretty fluffy. Let me break it down into practical stuff. Women saying no to men, not letting men have sex with them, causes men to step up. If, in order to have sex with them, women demanded you got a job and shaved every day and didn't dress like a dork or sit around playing video games, then all of us would do just that. We all want to have sex, right? ... And this in turn would be good for families, would be good for the communities.

A discreet person . . . • is strong, yet humble; • expresses genuine concern and interest; • exercises caution to avoid unnecessary risks; • knows intuitively when a situation or conversation is heading in the wrong direction; • does not need to tear others down to build himself up; • refrains from using foul language or speaking brashly; • regulates her reactions and responds appropriately; • takes the higher road rather than wrestling in the mud; • remains gracious and poised in the heat of the moment; • refrains from unnecessary confrontations; • does not break confidence or share other people’s secrets with which they have been entrusted; • communicates with deliberation and confidence.

Many Black men feel they have been driven into the grave by heart attacks and strokes while trying to appear as that solid rock for the individuals in their lives—be they children, spouse, lover, gay companion, what have you, who don't ever want to see them break down. These individuals don't want to see the person they labeled "provider" as having times of vulnerability. Which reaffirms why critiques of conventional notions of patriarchy are so important. Because that model of manhood denies the full humanity of men, denies that there are moments in men's lives when they need to say, "I can't go out there and do this stressful thing that is breaking my spirit anymore." Black men have not felt, especially the many Black men who have been strong providers, who have carried the mantle of representing a strong, dignified Black manhood, that they need a space to articulate their emotionaly vulnerability.

Feelings of a Pimp They think I was a player because I was devoted to the game They thought I worked hard on my offense to break down these women’s defenses just to score They think it’s the body count that made me manipulate them into my arms to get between their legs They think I’m satisfied with a different woman in my bed every night When during the day, even my bed can feel the loneliness They think I love the easy women They think it’s for the cool points that my heart grew cold They think they have me figured out Another dog chasing after every female dog in the streets They think I’m happy with all the texting buddies, but no wife But they don’t know They don’t know how tired I am of this, how tired I am of myself How tired I am of living like this How tired I am of these games, but that’s the only way I can score with a chick They don’t know how after sleeping with these ladies, I wish I had more chemistry with at least one of them to cuddle, to give goodnight kisses and wake up beside They don’t know how loneliness consumes me With a phone filled with women’s numbers, I still feel unwanted and unworthy They don’t know these easy women make it easy for me to feel confident about myself; although it’s the wrong type of confidence I feel validated by them, I feel accomplished, I feel loved although I’m having sex with them, not making love They don’t know how tired I am of chasing fool’s gold Chasing fast women who would sleep with me in a heartbeat Leaving me with the empty feeling I felt before I started the chase The player in me is played out. I just want love, but that’s the only thing I can’t seem to find So, I keep pimping in hope of finding love Her insecurities were beautiful They opened the door for me as an opportunist She was the perfect candidate Oh so sweet, but oh so hurt How smart would I be if I didn’t capitalize? Some fellas get women drunk and have their way with them I was doing nothing wrong but pretending to be prince charming, just to get the same results I became what they needed emotionally I was the shoulder to cry on, the ear to listen to, the one person who understood I was a smooth criminal manipulating the innocent Did not feel an ounce of guilt because I was weak myself I was insecure I couldn’t help preying on vulnerable women In their weakness I found strength I was a coward, a “wannabe” player I was playing the wrong games, winning the wrong prizes The truth is, no strong man takes advantage of a woman’s vulnerability. It is a trait of the weak. Diary of a Weak Man

Don’t get me wrong. For the most part, being strong got me through a lot. And I’m thankful that short of people dying on me, nothing can make me break down. There are times, however, when being strong feels a bit of a curse. You see, when you’re a very strong person, people always expect you to take care of yourself. People always expect you to put on a calm and collected exterior. You’re not given much room to freak out and be human.

Gardening Work There was a man breaking up the ground, getting ready to plant, when another man came by, "Why are you ruining this land?" "Don't interfere. Nothing can grow here until the earth is turned over and crumbled. There can be no roses and no orchard without first this devastation. You must lance an ulcer to heal. You must tear down parts of an old building to restore it." So it is with the sensual life that has no spirit. A person must face the dragon of his or her appetites with another dragon, the life energy of the soul. When that's not strong, everyone seems to be full of fear and wanting, as one thinks the room is spinning when one's whirling around. If your love has contracted into anger, the atmosphere itself feels threatening, but when you're expansive and clear, no matter what the weather, you're in an open windy field with friends. Many people travel as far as Syria and Iraq and meet only hypocrites. Others go all the way to India and see only people buying and selling. Others travel to Turkestan and China to discover those countries are full of cheats and sneak thieves. You always see the qualities that live in you. A cow may walk through the amazing city of Baghdad and notice only a watermelon rind and a tuft of hay that fell off a wagon. Don't repeatedly keep doing what your lowest self wants. That's like deciding to be a strip of meat nailed to dry on a board in the sun.

The desire for romantic love is so strong in our society that it could be seen as having displaced religion as the main source of ‘spiritual’ fulfilment and, indeed, almost displaced it as the means to personal salvation. ‘Saved by the love of a good woman’ may be a cliché but, in many instances, it is only the love of another person, man or woman, that gives some people a sense of worth or any meaning to their lives. This way of thinking, however, also leads to the expectation that one’s partner will – nay, should – make one truly happy. This puts an intolerable strain on many relationships, as it is unrealistic to demand that one’s partner provide a continuous supply of Rapture when permanence and stability are the very qualities the world of Rapture simply does not possess. Perhaps this is one reason why so many marriages break down these days. The

The vague fear I had felt at the Verdurins’ that Albertine might leave me, had originally faded. Arriving home, I had had the feeling of being a prisoner, not at all of returning to a female captive. But the forgotten fear had gripped me much more strongly when, at the moment I told Albertine that I had been to the Verdurins’, I saw on the surface of her face a look of mysterious irritation, which indeed was not appearing there for the first time. I knew that this look was the crystallization in the flesh of long-considered grievances, of ideas which were clear to the person forming them and keeping them secret, a synthesis become visible but no more rational, which the man who gathers the precious residue on the face of the woman he loves tries in his turn, in order to understand what is going on behind it, to analyze and break down into its intellectual components.

You have something to say to me, Cassidy, say it. Or shut the fuck up.” “All right,” Jules said. “I will.” He took a deep breath. Exhaled. “Okay, see, I, well, I love you. Very, very much, and . . .” Where to go from here . . .? Except, his plain-spoken words earned him not just a glance but Max’s sudden full and complete attention. Which was a little alarming. But it was the genuine concern in Max’s eyes that truly caught Jules off-guard. Max actually thought . . . Jules laughed his surprise. “Oh! No, not like that. I meant it, you know, in a totally platonic, non-gay way.” Jules saw comprehension and relief on Max’s face. The man was tired if he was letting such basic emotions show. “Sorry.” Max even smiled. “I just . . .” He let out a burst of air. “I mean, talk about making things even more complicated . . .” It was amazing. Max hadn’t recoiled in horror at the idea. His concern had been for Jules, about potentially hurting his tender feelings. And even now, he wasn’t trying to turn it all into a bad joke. And he claimed they weren’t friends. Jules felt his throat tighten. “You can’t know,” he told his friend quietly, “how much I appreciate your acceptance and respect.” “My father was born in India,” Max told him, “in 1930. His mother was white—American. His father was not just Indian, but lower caste. The intolerance he experienced both there and later, even in America, made him a . . . very bitter, very hard, very, very unhappy man.” He glanced at Jules again. “I know personality plays into it, and maybe you’re just stronger than he was, but . . . People get knocked down all the time. They can either stay there, wallow in it, or . . . Do what you’ve done—what you do. So yeah. I respect you more than you know.” Holy shit. Weeping was probably a bad idea, so Jules grabbed onto the alternative. He made a joke. “I wasn’t aware that you even had a father. I mean, rumors going around the office have you arriving via flying saucer—” “I would prefer not to listen to aimless chatter all night long,” Max interrupted him. “So if you’ve made your point . . .?” Ouch. “Okay,” Jules said. “I’m so not going to wallow in that. Because I do have a point. See, I said what I said because I thought I’d take the talk-to-an-eight-year-old approach with you. You know, tell you how much I love you and how great you are in part one of the speech—” “Speech.” Max echoed. “Because part two is heavily loaded with the silent-but-implied ‘you are such a freaking idiot.’” “Ah, Christ,” Max muttered. “So, I love you,” Jules said again, “in a totally buddy-movie way, and I just want to say that I also really love working for you, and I hope to God you’ll come back so I can work for you again. See, I love the fact that you’re my leader not because you were appointed by some suit, but because you earned very square inch of that gorgeous corner office. I love you because you’re not just smart, you’re open-minded—you’re willing to talk to people who have a different point of view, and when they speak, you’re willing to listen. Like right now, for instance. You’re listening, right?” “No.” “Liar.” Jules kept going. “You know, the fact that so many people would sell their grandmother to become a part of your team is not an accident. Sir, you’re beyond special—and your little speech to me before just clinched it. You scare us to death because we’re afraid we won’t be able to live up to your high standards. But your back is strong, you always somehow manage to carry us with you even when we falter. “Some people don’t see that; they don’t really get you—all they know is they would charge into hell without hesitation if you gave the order to go. But see, what I know is that you’d be right there, out in front—they’d have to run to keep up with you. You never flinch. You never hesitate. You never rest.

This is simply the long history of the origin of responsibility. That task of breeding an animal which can make promises, includes, as we have already grasped, as its condition and preliminary, the more immediate task of first making man to a certain extent, necessitated, uniform, like among his like, regular, and consequently calculable. The immense work of what I have called, "morality of custom", the actual work of man on himself during the longest period of the human race, his whole prehistoric work, finds its meaning, its great justification (in spite of all its innate hardness, despotism, stupidity, and idiocy) in this fact: man, with the help of the morality of customs and of social strait-waistcoats, was made genuinely calculable. If, however, we place ourselves at the end of this colossal process, at the point where the tree finally matures its fruits, when society and its morality of custom finally bring to light that to which it was only the means, then do we find as the ripest fruit on its tree the sovereign individual, that resembles only himself, that has got loose from the morality of custom, the autonomous "super-moral" individual (for "autonomous" and "moral" are mutually-exclusive terms),—in short, the man of the personal, long, and independent will, competent to promise, and we find in him a proud consciousness (vibrating in every fibre), of what has been at last achieved and become vivified in him, a genuine consciousness of power and freedom, a feeling of human perfection in general. And this man who has grown to freedom, who is really competent to promise, this lord of the free will, this sovereign—how is it possible for him not to know how great is his superiority over everything incapable of binding itself by promises, or of being its own security, how great is the trust, the awe, the reverence that he awakes—he "deserves" all three—not to know that with this mastery over himself he is necessarily also given the mastery over circumstances, over nature, over all creatures with shorter wills, less reliable characters? The "free" man, the owner of a long unbreakable will, finds in this possession his standard of value: looking out from himself upon the others, he honours or he despises, and just as necessarily as he honours his peers, the strong and the reliable (those who can bind themselves by promises),—that is, every one who promises like a sovereign, with difficulty, rarely and slowly, who is sparing with his trusts but confers honour by the very fact of trusting, who gives his word as something that can be relied on, because he knows himself strong enough to keep it even in the teeth of disasters, even in the "teeth of fate,"—so with equal necessity will he have the heel of his foot ready for the lean and empty jackasses, who promise when they have no business to do so, and his rod of chastisement ready for the liar, who already breaks his word at the very minute when it is on his lips. The proud knowledge of the extraordinary privilege of responsibility, the consciousness of this rare freedom, of this power over himself and over fate, has sunk right down to his innermost depths, and has become an instinct, a dominating instinct—what name will he give to it, to this dominating instinct, if he needs to have a word for it? But there is no doubt about it—the sovereign man calls it his conscience.

Do you ever feel like you are giving far fewer fucks and yet still caring so much it sometimes feels like there is only the most tissue-thin layer separating your soul from this world? Like your heart may be broken but your spirit is still rising? Are you refusing to conform and somehow still fitting just right? Able to look people right in the eye without apology and also like you’re a teenager again, bashful and blushing and off-kilter, like that moment when lips unexpectedly pressed against your head and face buried in your hair fingers trailed down y our arm, the way your stomach can flip-flop like that, even now. Do you ever walk on purpose even when you have nowhere to go? Do you notice things deeply, like dark red lipstick prints on pristine white coffee mugs? Like the way whiskey burns and cool white sheets feel against your skin at the end of the day? Are you claiming your identity, clear and strong and true, and also sinking into the vast unknowable mystery of your all? Do your days feel like longing and acquiescence and learning to stop grasping at things that are ready to leave or that choose not to come closer? Are you making a home of your own skin and inviting the world inside? Are you learning that cultivating solid boundaries and driving into a wide open horizon both feel like freedom, like the harsh desert mountains and the soft ocean wisdom and the road to healing that joins the two? Does it all feels like solidity, like truth, like forgiveness and recklessness and heat and sexy and holy, all rolled up together? Do you crave the burn of heat from another and the for nothing to be louder than sound of your own heartbeat, all at once? Do you finally know that you can choose a love and a life that does not break you? That you can claim a softer beauty and a kinder want. That even your animal hunger can soften its rough edges and say a full-throated yes to what is good and kind and holy. Do you remember that insanity is not a prerequisite for passion and that there is another pathway to your art, one that does not demand your pain as payment for its own becoming? Are you learning to show up? To take up space? To feel the power? Is it full of contradiction, does it feel like fire underwater, are you rising to sing?

Our second chakra, the Swadisthan, is located in the area of our abdomen and is governed by Mercury. Mercury governs in astrology the signs of Gemini and Virgo. This chakra's most important function is to break down fat cells in the stomach and provide the energy needed to renew white and gray cells within the brain. It also reinforces our capacity to think. This chakra supports all areas of our sense of esthetics and creativity. The ability to easily comprehend, and come up with practical solutions to our life and knowledge issues all come from this chakra. Mercury is an astrological representation of intelligence, mind and creativity. With this chakra pure knowledge flows into our being out of the Greater Consciousness. Mercury acts as a bridge between mind, spirit and matter. It rules science and the fine arts. Strong Mercury energy can connect even the most complex thoughts and difficult concepts in the birth chart. People who are under this planet's influence experience constant mental activity. This could produce an easily angry and impatient nature. The result is the same when we make too much use of the energy of our second chakra. A balanced Swadisthan provides a person with clear attention to making healthy decisions.

In social crisis and political revolution, when a government breaks down, power falls into the hands of the working masses; and for the propertied class, for capitalism arises the problem how to wrest it out of their hands. So it was in the past, so it may happen in the future. Democracy is the means, the appropriate instrument of persuasion. The arguments of formal and legal equality have to induce the workers to give up their power and to let their organization be inserted as a subordinate part into the State structure. Against this the workers have to carry in them a strong conviction that council organization is a higher and more perfect form of equality. It realizes social equality; it is the form of equality adapted to a society consciously dominating production and life. It might be asked whether the term democracy fits here, because the ending—"-cracy"—indicates domination by force, which here is lacking. Though the individuals have to conform to the whole there is no government above the people; people itself is government. Council organization is the very means by which working mankind, without need of a ruling government, organizes its vital activities. Adhering, then, to the emotional value attached of old to the word democracy we may say that council organization represents the higher form of democracy, the true democracy of labor. Political democracy, middle-class democracy, at its best can be no more than a formal democracy; it gives the same legal rights to everybody, but does not care whether this implies security of life; because economic life, because production is not concerned. The worker has his equal right to sell his labor power; but he is not certain that he will be able to sell it. Council democracy, on the contrary, is actual democracy since it secures life to all collaborating producers, free and equal masters of the sources of their life. The equal right in deciding needs not to be secured by any formal regulating paragraph; it is realized in that the work, in every part, is regulated by those who do the work. That parasites taking no part in production automatically exclude themselves from taking part in the decisions, cannot be considered as a lack in democracy; not their person but their function excludes them. It is often said that in the modern world the point of dispute is between democracy and dictatorship; and that the working class has to throw in its full weight for democracy. The real meaning of this statement of contrast is that capitalist opinion is divided whether capitalism better maintains its sway with soft deceitful democracy, or with hard dictatorial constraint. It is the old problem of whether rebellious slaves are kept down better by kindness or by terror. The slaves, if asked, of course prefer kind treatment to terror; but if they let themselves be fooled so as to mistake soft slavery for freedom, it is pernicious to the cause of their freedom. For the working class in the present time the real issue is between council organization, the true democracy of labor, and the apparent, deceitful middle-class democracy of formal rights. In proclaiming council democracy the workers transfer the fight from political form to economic contents. Or rather—since politics is only form and means for economy—for the sounding political slogan they substitute the revolutionizing political deed, the seizure of the means of production. The slogan of political democracy serves to detract the attention of the workers from their true goal. It must be the concern of the workers, by putting up the principle of council organization, of actual democracy of labor, to give true expression to the great issue now moving society.

Self-acceptance is a deep embrace of reality, letting go of punishing ourselves for the past, and the foundation that balances all the other tools we use for personal transformation. When our self-love becomes active, transformation is immediately set in motion. No transformation carries an unbreakable upward trajectory—we are bound to stumble, to momentarily regress to old habits, to move a few steps back before taking a life-changing leap forward, or to experience moments when we simply need a break. In our personal journey, every moment will not be a victory. Especially during tough times, when inner turmoil arises, it does not help to have a strong aversion to our own tension—that will only make the heaviness we already feel worse. The best way to be prepared for the long journey is to move through the ups and downs with self-acceptance.

Our first chakra is called the Mooladhara which is found under the spinal cord. This core also known as the root chakra is ruled by Mars, who is also the creator of the sign Aries. The chakra of mooladhara stands for innocence, honesty, pure childlike happiness, knowledge, sense of direction and a strong connection with earth and creation. This brings us strength and decisiveness in our action if this chakra is high within us, the ability to find the best direction in life to make the right decisions. Mars represents physical strength and behavior amicable and kind among planets. Mars ' strength is strong, ordinary and sometimes instinctive. With positive Mars energy our action carries physical dynamism and courage. Thanks to this energy, we live each day with a child's enthusiasm and a fresh desire to discover life. In astrology, Mars rules the sexual energy of a person. Mars that has been badly affected takes a person to extremes. Likewise, the Mooladhara chakra controls the reproductive organs, but due to hardships and things not harmless, its responsiveness is weakened. We will sense the goodness inside us and want to live as our first chakra is stronger accordingly. •       Our second chakra, the Swadisthan, is located in the area of our abdomen and is governed by Mercury. Mercury governs in astrology the signs of Gemini and Virgo. This chakra's most important function is to break down fat cells in the stomach and provide the energy needed to renew white and gray cells within the brain. It also reinforces our capacity to think. This chakra supports all areas of our sense of esthetics and creativity. The ability to easily comprehend, and come up with practical solutions to our life and knowledge issues all come from this chakra. Mercury is an astrological representation of intelligence, mind and creativity. With this chakra pure knowledge flows into our being out of the Greater Consciousness. Mercury acts as a bridge between mind, spirit and matter. It rules science and the fine arts. Strong Mercury energy can connect even the most complex thoughts and difficult concepts in the birth chart. People who are under this planet's influence experience constant mental activity. This could produce an easily angry and impatient nature. The result is the same when we make too much use of the energy of our second chakra. A balanced Swadisthan provides a person with clear attention to making healthy decisions.

There is no old age like anxiety,” said one of the monks I met in India. “And there is no freedom from old age like the freedom from anxiety.” In desperate love, we always invent the characters of our partners, demanding that they be what we need of them, and then feeling devastated when they refuse to perform the role we created in the first place. Generally speaking, though, Americans have an inability to relax into sheer pleasure. Ours is an entertainment-seeking nation, but not necessarily a pleasure-seeking one. Americans spend billions to keep themselves amused with everything from porn to theme parks to wars, but that’s not exactly the same thing as quiet enjoyment. The beauty of doing nothing is the goal of all your work, the final accomplishment for which you are most highly congratulated. The more exquisitely and delightfully you can do nothing, the higher your life’s achievement. You don’t necessarily need to be rich in order to experience this, either. I am having a relationship with this pizza, almost an affair. Without seeing Sicily one cannot get a clear idea of what Italy is. “No town can live peacefully, whatever its laws,” Plato wrote, “when its citizens…do nothing but feast and drink and tire themselves out in the cares of love.” In a world of disorder and disaster and fraud, sometimes only beauty can be trusted. Only artistic excellence is incorruptible. Pleasure cannot be bargained down. And sometimes the meal is the only currency that is real. The idea that the appreciation of pleasure can be an anchor of one’s humanity. You should never give yourself a chance to fall apart because, when you do, it becomes a tendency and it happens over and over again. You must practice staying strong, instead. People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that’s what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that’s holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then they leave. They break your heart open so new light could get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you had to transform your life. The Zen masters always say that you cannot see your reflection in running water, only in still water. Your treasure—your perfection—is within you already. But to claim it, you must leave the busy commotion of the mind and abandon the desires of the ego and enter into the silence of the heart. Balinese families are always allowed to eat their own donations to the gods, since the offering is more metaphysical than literal. The way the Balinese see it, God takes what belongs to God—the gesture—while man takes what belongs to man—the food itself.) To meditate, only you must smile. Smile with face, smile with mind, and good energy will come to you and clean away dirty energy. Even smile in your liver. Practice tonight at hotel. Not to hurry, not to try too hard. Too serious, you make you sick. You can calling the good energy with a smile. The word paradise, by the way, which comes to us from the Persian, means literally “a walled garden.” The four virtues a person needs in order to be safe and happy in life: intelligence, friendship, strength and (I love this one) poetry. Happiness is the consequence of personal effort. You fight for it, strive for it, insist upon it, and sometimes even travel around the world looking for it. Once you have achieved a state of happiness, you must never become lax about maintaining it, you must make a mighty effort to keep swimming upward into that happiness forever, to stay afloat on top of it.

you do have some sort of conflict, it feels like unbearable rejection. You might even harshly blame yourself for not being good enough to keep the other person from getting upset. This way of relating is exhausting and extremely unrewarding. Worse still, you never show your true self around others. You never state your opinion clearly, stand up for yourself, or do the things that will create a greater sense of self-confidence. Stuffing down your opinions can lead to internal feelings of anger and resentment. However, if you are a “nice guy,” then you are not supposed to feel angry, ticked off, irritated, or aggressive. Furthermore, direct expressions of anger are too risky, because the other person might be hurt and leave you, or get angry and retaliate. It is rare for someone with strong social anxiety to clearly and directly express his anger, such as looking at someone in the eye and saying, “When you did that, I felt very upset. I feel disappointed right now. I don’t like that you did that.

No one is saying that you aren’t strong, Adalina. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met. Fear drove me to stab my father when I was nine, but you never let fear drive you. You survived through sheer will. You didn’t let your father break you. You didn’t let his men tear you down. I want to hold you up and strengthen you, but I know that I will never be the force behind you. You are a complete person without me, cara mia. There is nothing I can give you to make you whole; I can only stand beside you and strengthen the parts where you are weak.” “What’s in it for you?” Her eyebrows knit together in confusion. “What are you getting out of this?” I shrug because I don’t know. I’ve never wanted a wife. I’ve never wanted children. I’ve never seen a family as an extension of who I am. I’ve always only ever seen myself and my future. But when Adalina entered the picture, I began to see so much more. We can be so much more together. “You, my love, just you. That’s all I need.